Pansexual girl and accidental activist

Tag Archives: kink

Someone on another site asked why so many people were so down on Fifty Shades. This was my answer, and the reason why I urge everyoneto not spend any money supporting the books, or the upcoming movies.

(Trigger warnings all around for stalking, rape, and domestic violence. Please do not read this if such discussions upset you.)

I’ve been actively kinky for over a decade. Actively involved in the BDSM community. I had one Dom/sub relationship, in which I was the sub, that lasted over 7 years. Following that, I was in an abusive relationship that masqueraded as a D/s dynamic, for almost a year. I’m in another healthy D/s relationship, now, and a vocal feminist and advocate for consent, so I think I’m at least decently qualified to explain the difference between healthy BDSM and domestic/partner abuse.

The difference is informed, ONGOING, enthusiastic consent.

As a feminist, I believe that the only way it is okay for a woman to be subjugated in any way by a man is if she chooses to do so, from a place of empowerment and knowledge.

That is absolutely NOT what is portrayed in the books… and yes, I’ve reluctantly trudged through reading all three. So, I will tell you why it is glorifying abuse, and how that is insulting to me, personally, as a feminist, as a woman, and as a submissive in a D/s dynamic.

1. Christian isn’t a romantic. He’s a stalker. His being rich and handsome doesn’t change that. Without asking her outright for the information, he uses his sooper-dooper-sekrit ring of wealthy acquaintances to find out where she works, and when she would be on the clock, and just… shows up there. Three hours away from his home. To buy ROPE and ZIP TIES.

A tailor-made kidnapping kit. Because that’s not creepy at all.

2. He’s a jealous, power-mad control freak, which he freely admits in their first meeting, and demonstrates in an admirably despicable fashion during his little kidnapping preparation trip. At this point, he and Ana barely know one another, yet the mere implication that some other dude may have some importance in her life, even just as a friend, already infuriates him. HUGE red flag. Healthy, secure men – hell, healthy, secure people, do NOT freak out if someone they barely know has a conversation with someone else – of any gender. PERIOD. It’s not sexy, it’s fucking dangerous.

He stalks her again when she’s at the bar, by tracing her cell phone, and shows up, ordering her around. That wasn’t a rescue, folks. It was a territory-marking pissing contest. Again, not a thing that healthy adults do.

He practically threatens her when she takes a phone call from a male friend. He tries to control her visits with her family, what she wears, what she eats, when she sleeps. And SHE HAD NOT CONSENTED TO THIS. Which brings me to…

3. Consent. THERE ISN’T ANY. One, she never signs the ridiculous contract. Two, she isn’t well enough informed to give informed consent. Three, he is manipulating her from the very beginning. Four, there’s a HUGE power imbalance between the two of them. He’s older, much more sexually experienced, much more experienced with (his fucked up version of) s&m, rich, powerful, and persuasive. Decent people who have that much power do not use it to manipulate, deceive, and control people who don’t. You know who does? Sociopaths.

4. RAPE. Yeah. That’s right. I said it. He rapes her. She is actively telling him no. And he threatens to tie her down, if she fights. He’s bigger, stronger, and more powerful in every way, and she’s already revealed that she’s terrified of him, and he’s ignoring her wishes, ignoring her struggles, and RAPING her. Furthermore, EL James has the nerve to portray a very clear rape… then tell her readers that the victim liked it.She should be strung up and beaten within an inch of her talentless life, just for that.

I’ll be honest. What’s known as “rape play,” or consensual non-consent, is a thing that exists. It’s a thing many people, myself included, actually enjoy. But that isn’t what was portrayed in that godawful account. In order for that to be something that is in any way morally defensible or ethically justifiable, both parties have to be on the same page. Something like that has to be discussed at exhaustive lengths. Negotiated. I’ll try to break it down as simply as possible, and give you a hypothetical example.

Let’s say I want to try this with my dominant boyfriend. He needs to know which things are on the table, and which aren’t. I might, for instance, be fine with him slapping my face with an open hand, but not punching me. I might be okay with him putting a blindfold over my eyes, but not a hood over my whole face. I might want him to ignore it if I say “no,” but that would mean I’d need a safeword that actually means stop, and does NOT get ignored. We need to discuss possible triggers this might set off, and what I might need from him, in order to handle them, afterwards… or vice versa. He might be triggered by it, too, and need comfort from me, after. After all, this is a deep dark thing to do with anyone, and he loves me. As a decent human being, he might very well struggle with feelings of guilt and worry and shame, even if he knows I wanted it.

Christian does nothing of the sort with Ana. What he does to her is actual, prosecute-able, first degree rape, in all fifty states. Inexcusable, and horrifying – in context or out.

He bullies her into the relationship, all the while warning her against it. Which, if you ask professionals, is one hallmark behavior of a sociopath. One of their favorite manipulation tools. A thing abusers do, in order to suck in their victims.

Outside of my utter outrage at EL James for totally, unabashedly, horrific accounts of abuse and rape, disguised as BDSM, I hated the books for many other reasons.

As a feminist, I am just disgusted by her portrayal of every woman in the story. Ana is a flighty, ignorant, naive, deliberately helpless, indecisive, flaky, little prat, with no self esteem, who is completely out of touch with her own sexuality, her own better instincts, and just plain common fucking sense. Christian’s ex-mistress is a pedophile, and a manipulative, controlling ice queen. His former submissive is completely crazy, mentally and emotionally incapable of functioning without this man in her life, telling her what to do. Ana’s BFF is almost a non-person, as are most other female characters. They all seem to need men to take care of business for them, in one way or another. You can practically hear the Scarlett O’Hara Fiddle-dee-dee of the damned early 20th century, before women could even vote, in every single description, speech, or dialogue.

As a writer… oh, holy hell. It’s hard to even know where to begin, it’s so terrible. First of all, Twilight was pretty awful. Of course, Twilight was written with preteens in mind. 50 Shades is openly nothing more than a shoddyTwilight fanfic. And the writing is even worse than Stephanie Meyer’s Mormon Vampire Tales. I swear to all things sacred and good, if I ever have to read one more Holy crap!, one more inner goddess, one more improper use of the word subconscious, I am going to puke up every meal I’ve eaten in the last eight months, all over Ana’s Inner Goddess.

As a reader of erotica, I am beyond underwhelmed. I’m whatever is under underwhelmed. No adult woman should, during a sexual encounter, refer to her vajayjay as down there. And does anybody actually call their hooha, their sex? James may as well have actually written vajayjay and hooha, coochie and vagoo. And that goes double for the descriptions of Christian’s throbbing meat hammer, which is referred to as his erection, his manhood. I’m sorry, but when I read smut, I want to hear about cocks and cunts, dicks and pussies. I don’t want some pseudo-clinical, dry-as-a-bone (pun intended), watered-down language that sucks (pun still intended) all the sexy right out of the sex. She made it sound like some fucked up story for kids. Richard Scary’s Trip to the Family Planning Center, or Dr. Seuss’s Better Beware of the Weather Down There.

As a kinky person, a member of the BDSM community, I am just pissed off. She makes it seem as though the only way anyone would have a desire to engage in kink would be if they were fucked up. Crazy. Mentally ill. This is both a blatant falsehood and a disservice to mentally ill people (as if mental illness wasn’t already stigmatized enough). Kink does not equal abuse, but her books make them seem the same. And mental illness isn’t fucked up-ness. It’s a thing 95% of us will experience, at some point in our lives.

As I mentioned above, engaging in kink requires informed, ongoing, enthusiastic consent from all parties involved. Do some assholes, abusers, and predators abuse people, under the guise of kink? Of course they do. There are dangerous assholes in every subculture. Just ask the Pope. But that’s still abuse. Calling it BDSM doesn’t make it so. Kinky people aren’t fifty shades of fucked up; they’re just aroused by different things. There are ethical ways to engage in that, and it’s irresponsible not to make that distinction, when so many vanilla soccer moms are now clamoring for their very own GrandMasterHighPoobahOfPain. If someone hits you without your consent, it’s assault and battery. If someone penetrates you without your consent, that’s rape. Legally. Literally. Everywhere.

So, there you go. The relationship portrayed is physically, mentally, sexually, financially, and psychologically abusive,by definition. The writing is inexcusably bad. And kink isn’t really like that.

Does that harsh some folks’ lady-boners? I’m sure it does. Sorrynotsorry. There’s much better smut out there, and a ton of it is written without glorifying abuse. In a time when women in the US are having to fight for the reproductive freedoms that were already won, we shouldn’t be giving this sort of thing any kind of financial support.

I urge you, instead of spending your money on such trash, to rent a decent movie, and donate the money you save to a domestic violence organization of your choice. And if you’re just hard-up for wank material, hit me up. I’ll point you in the direction of some erotica that will have your inner goddess saying much more raunchy things than Holy crap.

Shame is an emotion with which we become familiar at a very young age. It’s used as a tool, in everything from parenting to education to employment to business to healthcare to social media.

A small child learns about a parent’s displeasure, and begins to associate the language, tone, and nonverbal language of disappointment or condemnation with (hopefully) maladaptive or dangerous or unhealthy behaviors.

School-age children are shamed for their antisocial or dangerous or disruptive behavior every day. Names are written on the board, or behavior cards are “turned” from green to yellow to red, as publicly visible indicators of whether or not the children have been well behaved.

Employers will often post notices, or send out memos, naming the people who, for instance, haven’t completed their work by a specified deadline.

Businesses post signs that draw attention to impolite customers who talk on their cell-phones while conducting transactions, and employees are told to ask offenders, in front of other customers, to step out of line until they’ve finished their conversations.

In each of these cases, shame serves a purpose, both to the individuals, and to the social groups in which the shaming takes place. Individuals learn about unacceptable behaviors, and that engaging in those behaviors can lead to scrutiny and discomfort. The social groups benefit when the individuals behave in the ways that are most beneficial to the group, as a whole.

Of course, that isn’t the only way shame is utilized. It is all too often treated as a weapon. Slut shaming implies that women who enjoy their own sexuality, on their own terms, are somehow dirty, immoral, and lewd. Body shaming plays on the insecurities of other people, with digs at their worth as humans, based on some physical characteristics.

And, of course, there’s victim shaming. This is a form of weaponized shame that targets people who have already been harmed by the behaviors of others, based on a nebulous and unconquerable list of dos and dont’s, shoulds and shouldn’ts, and personal strategies generalized to entire populations. It comes in so many different flavors, it puts Baskin-Robbins to… well… shame.

At its base, victim-shaming is placing the onus for feeling bad about what was done on the person who was acted on, rather than the person acting.

As they are the most common target (or, at least, the most commonly targeted victims I’ve seen), all of my examples will be focused on abuse, sexual assault, sexual harassment, or rape victims. Also, I will be using gender-specific pronouns. This does not mean that I believe that onlywomen are victims of rape, abuse, or victim shaming, or that only men are rapists or abusers, or that people who identify with something other than binary gender roles cannot be either, and is only used for the sake of (relative) brevity (HA!) and simplicity.

She wore something that exposed too much skin.

She was walking alone at night.

She was walking alone during the day.

She was in a bad neighborhood.

She was in a frat house.

She was in a dance club.

She was at a bar.

She didn’t practice the buddy system.

She had too much to drink.

She was in a relationship with an obviously bad person (because “good” people don’t do these things, and it’s really easy to tell the difference without long-term acquaintance).

She was too dependent on him.

She was too independent, which threatened his masculinity.

She was too meek, and let him walk all over her.

She was too outspoken, which was antagonizing to him.

She presented a front of a happy partner/spouse to everyone else.

She complained too much to everyone else about the relationship.

She smiled at him, which means she was giving off the wrong signals.

She didn’t smile at him, which means she was being rude.

She was too friendly with him.

She wasn’t friendly enough.

She rejected him.

She didn’t overtly, or explicitly, reject him.

She didn’t leave after the abuse started.

She tried to leave, and it made him angry.

She allowed herself to be alone with him.

She didn’t explicitly say “no.”

She didn’t say “no” loud enough.

She didn’t physically fight him off.

She didn’t physically fight hard enough.

She didn’t learn self defense, beforehand.

She antagonized him into escalating the violence, by fighting back.

She didn’t have pepper spray, a taser, or a gun in her handbag.

She shouldn’t have been carrying a weapon he could take away and use against her.

She didn’t report the abuse/rape to law enforcement.

She didn’t report the abuse/rape soon enough.

She didn’t get the precise timeline and/or every detail letter perfect, in the midst of processing the trauma, so…

She was exaggerating/lying when she reported to law enforcement.

She didn’t cry or seem visibly distressed when discussing the abuse/rape.

She was overly dramatic/overly emotional when she discussed the abuse/rape.

She got over it too fast.

She didn’t get over it fast enough.

She didn’t process it the way x person thought she should.

She refused to share details with uninvolved people.

She aired too much dirty laundry.

She won’t shut up about what happened.

She won’t talk about what happened.

She won’t shut up about the other people who are suffering the way she did.

She doesn’t do enough to protect other possible victims.

She’s focusing too much on the people who do bad things to others.

She won’t move on with her life.

She’s a “perpetual victim.”

Whew. That was depressing to type. And exhausting, both mentally and emotionally. What’s worse, that is by no means a comprehensive list of all the shaming tactics that victims of abuse, sexual assault, sexual harassment, or rape routinely face. Personally, I don’t know a single survivor who hasn’t faced at least a half dozen of them.

As a reminder, all of those are tactics used to shame the person who was ACTED ON, rather than the person who acted.

As a culture, we expend an awful lot of effort and energy on these types of things. Why? How do we, individually or as a culture/subculture, benefit from them?

We don’t. Go back through that list. As you read each of the things listed, as yourself three questions:

1) How does this other person doing this thing, in response to being victimized, impact the quality of my life?

2) How does this other person doing this thing, in response to being victimized, impact the safety of the social group/subculture I share with them?
3) Am I, or is that social group, harmed or made less safe in any way that is actually the fault of either the person who was victimized, their behavior before/during the assault/rape/abuse, or their response to it?

If we’re being honest with ourselves, the answer, across the board, is a resounding NO.

Yet we continue to shame them.

Now, ask yourself if your social group or subculture is harmed, or made less safe, by the rapist, the abuser, the harasser, or the perpetrator of sexual assault. Go ahead. I’ll wait.

So, instead of shaming the victims, why are we not shaming the people who acted on them? Why are we not shaming the behaviors that actually cause harm? Why are we so very hesitant to call out the harmful behaviors, and the bits and pieces of our culture which contribute to them? Why is there so very much pushback against that kind of shaming, and so very little against the rampant victim-shaming?

Of course, some of us are. Some of us are trying very hard to tilt the balance in that direction. And we face an awful lot of criticism and anger and shouting and pontificating and name-calling, and, yes, even shaming, for doing so.

Again… why?

I think it has to do, mostly, with fear.

Fear is not a rational emotion. It is instinctive, and often illogical, especially when we’re not discussing immediate physical threats to our own individual well-being.

I think, perhaps, that there are two types of fear that contribute to this shame-the-victim-but-never-the-perpetrator ethos.

One is the quite understandable fear of becoming victims, ourselves. It’s understandable, because it’s a very real threat. The problem isn’t that we’re afraid of being victimized, it’s the way we are responding to that fear. We’re responding by telling ourselves that there are things we can do, or avoid doing, that will render us invincible to becoming victims, or becoming victims again, in some cases. We want to believe that we have the ultimate power to keep other people from doing bad things to us, so we convince ourselves that this is true.

We convince ourselves that if we follow a list of dos and don’ts, if we are “resilient” enough, if we simply choose not to be victims, then we won’t be. We convince ourselves that we are, therefore, enlightened, and more protected, than those “perpetual victims” who don’t think like we do. We convince ourselves that some combination of behaviors and attitudes can work as an incantation to ward off the evils of the world.

Unfortunately, that isn’t true. Unfortunately, there is NOTHING we can do, individually, that will make us invincible to others who want, or do not know better than to cause us harm. No amount of resilience or confidence or preparation or prevention can change that.

The flip-side of that fear is the fear that we might, ourselves, whether intentionally or through ignorance, cause or have caused that kind of harm in others. That our behavior, somewhere along the line, may have crossed the line. That other people may see us as rapists, abusers, violators. That we might have to see ourselves that way. And this is terrifying, to most of us. The idea that we might “be that guy,” even though, perhaps, we never intended to be.

This fear leads to a knee-jerk defensiveness and denial which, while understandable, is entirely counterproductive, and even childish. It’s the train of thought that says, I once had sex with a woman who was incapacitated. Only bad people rape. I’m not a bad person, therefore having sex with incapacitated people isn’t rape.

Because it’s easier to deny that a thing is wrong, emotionally, than it is to admit we may have done a wrong thing.

Because there’s a false association going on, that only “bad people” can do “bad things,” and that line of thought just doesn’t line up with reality. We’re all human. We all make mistakes. We all learn some busted things, at some point. We all keep learning, I hope, throughout our lives. Sometimes, we learn that the things we once learned were wrong, or flawed in some way. The appropriate response to that is not to deny the wrongness of what we once understood, in order to alleviate ourselves from guilt or shame. It is to learn from it, and grow, and become better human beings. People who don’t do the things we now understand to not be okay, even if we didn’t understand it, before.

And a part of that shift is shifting the shame. Instead of shaming victims, or their behaviors, or even shaming people, we need to be shaming the behaviors that are causing harm. The dehumanization of women and transpeople and people of non-binary gender. The marginalization of those who are “different,” whether that difference is race, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, ability, economic status, or some other thing altogether. The levels of culturally accepted aggression towards those people. The idea that the onus for halting any interpersonal contact is on the person being acted on, instead of the personacting. Victim blaming, silencing, and shaming. Brushing abusive behavior under the rug. Excusing or enabling abuses to continue. All of those behaviors are shame-worthy.

Being victimized is not.

It is far past time for us – ALL of us – to shift the shame to where it belongs.

We learn a lot of lessons, throughout our lives. Some lessons are helpful, some harmful. Some of both are useful. Many times, the lessons we pack up in our childhoods, and carry out into the world as we seek our fortunes, are entirely busted, damaging internal monologues. Sometimes, we are fortunate enough to be able to see those destructive and limiting things for what they are, through some epiphany or slowly dawning awareness. Some of them, we may not ever recognize, or if we do, we may not have the power to do away with them.

And some of them we identify, battle, and in the best cases, overcome, with lots of introspection, conversation, research, and hard, often thankless, usually emotionally exhausting work.

I learned very early in life that things were my responsibility. All the things. If they went wrong, it was bound to be my fault, somehow. If someone was angry, I had done something to either cause or contribute to it. If I was part of a conflict, it was my job to apologize and make amends and do whatever it took to stop the contention, even if that meant admitting to being wrong when I wasn’t. It was my job to make peace.

Logically, I’ve known, for some time, that such is not the case. Apparently, the little gremlins in my head, the ones who were born to remind me how it was all my fault, didn’t get the memo. They like to point to every piece of anything that exists anywhere, and try to twist it, if necessary, to put me back in my place. That place where I placate. Where I give in to whatever everyone else wants, regardless of how I feel or what I believe, to make peace. To keep everyone liking me, and not be alone, and make as many people as possible happy, no matter what happens to me, in the process.

The last year has been a whirlwind I never could have imagined. The last six months has been a whirlwind encapsulated in a raging forest fire. It has swept away almost all of the life I knew, bit by bit, and every new piece that blew away was another devastating kick in the gut. Another chance for the gremlins to rear their nasty little heads. Every e-mail or criticism or discarded friendship (no matter which party did the discarding) was another week, another month, another three months, of picking apart everything I’d said, everything I’d written, everything I’d done, trying to find evidence to support the gremlins. Trying hard. I wanted it to be my fault. That? It’s easy. I know how to handle it. I know how to address the things I screwed up, even when I really didn’t. I have had loads of practice making peace.

About a month ago, the latest big blow fell. I just didn’t realize it, at the time. I simply thought this particular friend, who has always had a tendency to be sort of unresponsive to phone communication, was doing her usual thing. It turns out, my relationship choices with other people led her to decide that she wanted nothing else to do with me (…and, no, to you straw-grasping simpletons, this is not the ‘same thing,’ but I will get to that bit, soon enough.). I only discovered this about a week or so ago, and have been spending a large portion of the intervening time, once again, revisiting every thing I’ve ever written about consent, about safe spaces, about enabling and apologists and rape culture and victim blaming and every other piece of this thing I’ve felt moved to put down in words. I re-read all of the various Fet-mail threads with the people I once considered chosen family and close friends. I replayed telephone conversations in my head. I tried very hard to find the place where I had gone wrong.

Was my tone sometimes harsh? Um… have you met me? Snark and sarcasm, dry humor and somewhat sharp tones are a part of nearly everything I write. Don’t believe me? Here are a few quotes from some of my attempts at erotica:

“It’s Sunday, one of the agreed-upon days, so I left the fluffy pup sound asleep in his open crate, whimpering slightly, obviously dreaming doggie dreams of squirrels and hot St. Bernard girls.”

“True story. Names have been omitted to protect the….well, shit. Never mind. i just left out the names, that’s all.”

“The masochist in me, however, wanted no part of that whiny little loser twat.”

“A random thought… When did He manage to pullthatout? …flitted across my mind, as his cock slammed into my throat…

‘What are you enjoying? What is it that has you so soaking wet? Hmmm?’

Inwardly, I groaned. He was going to make me talk. I didn’t want to talk, dammit, and it hurt to make words. It hurt my brain to try to think of the right words to string together to make him understand the part of me that was actually angry with him for being so tender, after building me up to the brutality for which I hungered in spite of myself. I wanted to be eloquently gutter-mouthed. I wanted my words to spur him on to hurt me even more.‘The pain, Sir,’ I croaked. Derp.“

And all of ↑that↑? Was when I was trying to be sexy. O.o

I snark. It’s simply what I do. I do it when I write, when I speak… hell, I am pretty sure that I do it in my dreams. Furthermore, it really is not anyone else’s place to tell me that my tone, speaking as a victim and survivor and advocate for other victims and survivors, is inappropriate. If you don’t like it, you absolutely do not have to read it. You can go away, and I promise the internet won’t die, nor the rotation of the globe come screeching to a halt. Cross my heart. You aren’t the arbiter of appropriate tones. Nobody died and/or appointed you the polite police. You simply don’t get to tell me which tone is most appropriate for conveying what I want to convey, nor that what I was trying to convey is something other than specifically what I say it is. You don’t get to outlaw or define either my intent or my tone.

Was my content harsh? You betcha. I’m not talking about puppies and rainbows. I’m talking about harsh, gritty reality. Not just reality, but the nasty, slimy underbelly that so many don’t want to see. We don’t often want to know that the monster under the bed is our own complacence or complicity or entitlement. You don’t bring those things to the light of day with auto-generated Chopra platitudes. These things aren’t meant to be a soft, gentle caress. They’re a slap in the face. A wake-up call. The acrid odor of smelling salts. Nobody is under any obligation to make that pretty or comfortable for you, nor to care if you take offense. It isn’t pretty, and it’s too damned comfortable for too many people, already. Making enough people uncomfortable enough to create a cultural shift is kind of the point.

Did I make some very polarizing statements, lay out some black-and-white choices, and give ultimatums? Yep. There aren’t very many things in life that are absolutes, black and white, right and wrong. Rape, abuse, assault, and other consent violations are wrong, mmmkay? Doesn’t matter what you meant to do. If you unintentionally violated someone’s consent, then you fucked up. Either you own it, and do your best to alleviate whatever harm was done, or you’re an egotistical ass, and I give precisely zero fucks for your reputation, in light of your total lack of empathy or accountability. You run a venue without a clear-cut and accessible consent policy? Ass. No fucks given. You tell victims and survivors that it’s no big deal if they got violated, as long as they don’t kick up a fuss, because, after all, we’re all adults, here? Ass. No fucks. You value the hypothetical reputations of a very, very few, over the safety and personal agency and physical autonomy of the many? You preach “personal responsibility” to real and suffering victims of other people’s predatory or otherwise shitty behavior, but blame all the cray-cray bitches for the supposed plague of hypothetical “false accusations?” Asshole. The only fuck you get is off.

I will not apologize for that. Not one damned bit of it. I’m NOT sorry.

See, in going back through all of what I had to say, I saw this evolution. The first time out, the one that pissed off so many people because ultimatums? I was making a very real effort to be nice. I read through the comments thread twice. Unless someone was an absolute asshat, I was even placatory. Trying to keep the peace, even with people whose views and ‘contributions’ made me feel dirty and like I might throw up a little in my mouth. Bending over backwards to assure everyone that even if they disagreed with something that is, to me, a very clear-cut instance of right/wrong, I’d still pet their precious egos, and allow them in my life.

Going back much, much further? I found a pretty long string of that, much of it with some of the very people participating in that thread. Two of them made up what I once, as a relative newbie, considered one of the local ‘power-couples,’ who were role models, leaders, or what-have-you. They were the first ones to whom I ever voiced a concern about the way we brushed things under the rug, something like seven or eight years ago. I swallowed the don’t-stir-the-pot thing like a bitter pill, even then, but I kept my mouth shut. They weren’t just enablers. They were actively silencing anyone who would even attempt to speak up about something that was obviously and heinously broken.

And there I was, trying to reassure them that I would maintain friendships, even though they were, from positions of influence, preaching a code of silence that I found ethically abhorrent. Sure. We were friends. I helped them out, sometimes. They helped me out, sometimes. I was grateful when they helped, and vice versa. I mourned the loss of the friendships pretty hard. But I got rid of that nasty taste that my association with their pandering, condescending, silencing bullshit left in my mouth. I could live with myself. I may have all the love in the world for someone, but I’ve reached a point where no association is worth feeling like a hypocrite. Feeling like I am being untrue to myself.

There was another, one who took umbrage to my tone, to my ultimatums, and how the butthurt burned! Funny thing. On a thread discussing a different, but also completely horrid type of oppression, this very same person was asked who they were, to say that people were either “with them or against them.” And they replied with something along the lines of, It’s either yes or no. There is no third option. Hmmm. Sounds suspiciously familiar, but I guess that only applies whenyou are the one who is being harmed by the status quo. Fuck everybody else, AMIRITE?

I guess I missed the day when the arbiters of all things right and wrong waved their sparkly magic wands and deemed some people more worthy of being free of oppression than others. Oops. I’ll dock my assistant’s pay for that scheduling snafu.

Anyway, I was trying to get my point across in as palatable a fashion as possible, without sacrificing either my friendships or my conscience.

I was lambasted. Called a bully, of all things. Because we all know that the people with less power are always the bullies. I lost several friends. The smarmers came oozing out of the fake stone walls of their dungeons to talk about “polite discourse,” and how many sides there are to every story, like it’s a math word problem in some old textbook.

If rapist A leaves the party at 1:45 a.m., travelling East, and rapist B leaves the party at 3:10 a.m., travelling Northwest, how many people can screech about personal responsibility to the victim, before both rapists are safely tucked into their beds?

The Mutt and Jeff of straw men, LYNCH MOBS! and WITCH HUNTS! were trotted out. Little life-tip? If you use those comparisons to represent anything less than actual, heinous tortures and murders and societal approbation of horrificinjustices? You’re a twunt, with no concept of nuance or discernment, and should probably step away from the internet, posthaste and permanently. Your point of view is morally indefensible, and your comparisons are absurd.

On we go, and my Owner and Lover, -Bishop-, posted his position. He didn’t fuck around with the niceties. He was pretty clearly stating that he chose not to be friends with anyone who would choose to be friends with a known abuser – in this case, the man who abused me. I was pretty astonished at some of the sources of the pushback. It wasn’t because they disagreed with his ethical stance, so much as it was them being personally affronted by being asked to take a public stand. There was a fuckton of “You can’t make me and I’m taking my toys and going home!” Loads more accusations of bullying, witch hunts, and lynch mobs.

Here’s the explanation I promised, earlier. No. My former friend choosing to turn her back on me, because of other friendships I had ended, is not the same as what Bishop and I did. Why? Because I didn’t abuse anyone. I didn’t rape anyone. I didn’t violate anyone’s hard limits. I didn’t assault anyone. Everyone has the right to choose with whom they wish to associate. You don’t want to be my friend, that’s fine. But don’t try to act like you’re on some moral high ground. If our friendship ended over my stance on consent, that’s not a place you occupy.

I get it. In many of our communities, popularity is the only currency you have. It’s much more dependent on being agreeable, kissing the right asses, knowing how to schmooze, and skill with a flogger or rope or needles than it is on having principles or ethics. And the price for popularity is not ever letting pesky little things like integrity or empathy get in the way of everyone else’s good time. It is a really clear message, and there are few of us who don’t hear it.

Be “nice.” Be “respectful.” Be “polite.” Go along to get along. Don’t stir the pot. No “drama!” Work together!

Popularity isn’t worth it, if the price is pandering to those who silence and shame victims. I spent almost nine years capitulating to that bullshit. I was a coward, then. So are all of the people still currently sacrificing their integrity on the altar of popularity. And those who are spreading the pressure to “be nice,” to “work together,” even with people whose ideas are directly contributing to the problem,are far worse than cowards. They’re bullies.

This thing to which I’ve devoted so much of my time and energy wasn’t about me. Not even in the beginning. It has always been about addressing a problem that is rampant in many, if not most, of our communities. It began as me trying to address the issues in the community I used to call my home. The person who abused me, as well as several other known predators, were still operating there with impunity. My own personal sociopath has flown south. On that level, it worked. But there are still far too many predators making that community their hunting ground. There are still far too many people to whom others look as leaders, who are perpetuating the busted silencing and shaming culture that allows them to get away with it.

By and large, it has been made pretty clear that I’m not a part of that community, anymore. That was a very hard thing, for me. I had invested an awful lot in it, over the last decade, and really loved a lot of the people with whom I no longer associate. But that wasn’t my fault, and I’m done trying to find a way to make it be my fault, so that I can fix it. Yes, I did what I did with intent. I chose to fight this battle. I didn’t have any clue that the other side would be so viciously defensive of something so obviously fucked up. I don’t regret anything I’ve done, and would do it again, in a heartbeat. It was, and remains, the right thing.

As much as I’d like to say I don’t give a damn about them, I still do. I still care about that community, and I still want to see them fix the missing stairs. Whether or not they ever decide to do so, though, I intend to keep doing what I’m doing.

BECAUSE I still care, and they’re still getting it WRONG. The way they’ve ostracized me is simply one example of how. Because what I’ve been doing ishaving an impact, and not just locally. Because this is a change that needs to happen, in ALL the kinky communities where it hasn’t, already.

And no. I won’t be “polite” about it. I won’t try to “get along” with the folks who are, even in the discussions that start as a way to encourage the changes, perpetuating the status quo. It isn’t my job to “convince” the stalwartly wrong and the terminally obtuse of a damned thing. But all of that is material for the next post, and this one’s long enough.

I have been involved in the kink lifestyle, both online and in meatspace, since 2005. I’ve blogged only on kink sites, beginning on Alt.com, and continuing on FetLife, as bitchypoo.

I experienced a lot of the seedy underbelly of the kink world. My most recent experience with that inspired me to become a consent activist. I’ve lost many friendships, but made so many wonderful and inspiring new friends, along the way. I’ve been asked, a time or three, to post some of what I write on FetLife in someplace more accessible, and less of what one of my friends called “a walled garden.”

So, here I am.

I’ll start with a thing I wrote about a month ago, which explains the name of this blog. I hope you enjoy!

(TW: broad-strokes child sexual abuse, rape, domestic violence)

I was raised in a place where feminist was synonymous with either dyke or whore, and both were very bad things. I lived in constant unconscious certainty that men had the power over everything, and that was the way it had always been, and would probably be the way it would continue to be, forever and ever, Amen. Praise Jesus and pass the venison.

Of course, I outgrew most of what I learned from my upbringing, but I still had this aversion to feminism. To be completely honest, the term still makes me cringe a little. Instead of seeing better examples or a less negative image of feminism as I worked my way through adulthood, parenting, working, and BDSM, I got just the opposite. Most of the people I knew, even the most progressive or radical in every other way, discussed feminism with a sneer. The perception of feminism I had was this, and this, and this. Crazy extremism to the point of absolute absurdity.

I believed in taking personal responsibility, but I’d never even considered the ideathat anyone could extend that to the point where rape wasn’t the rapist’s fault. I’d never really grasped how people around me blamed women for being abused, often in somewhat subtle ways, but sometimes blatantly, and always as if stating facts. Like this is just how it is. Bitchz be trippin’, yo.

Overlaying all of this was my own experience with being victimized. Early childhood full of physical fights between my parents until they divorced. Seriously controlling, extremely patriarchal upbringing in a house full of bigotry and right-wing ideology and Baptist dogma. Being molested for five years by my stepfather, then shamed, blamed, gaslighted and silenced when I finally spoke out. Gang rape at 15. Dosed and raped at 19. Married to a man who, long before the wedding, blamed me for my own rape, and made it clear that he would leave me if I resisted having sex with him, whenever he wanted it, after. Finally left him, after over 7 years of a redneck, pothead, gambling, idiotic nightmare.

Enter BDSM. Male dominant, OPP poly for the first 7 1/2 years. And public play, usually on my own. In another post, I detail some of the consent violations I have experienced in my time in the scene.

I was the good girl, throughout. The quiet girl. The one who didn’t make any waves about the idea that I had a right not to be violated. I had internalized the idea that, if I just did all the right things, I could avoid being a victim again. Except, that’s not really how it works, and I found that out the hard way.

And I stopped being quiet. I started making waves.

The funny thing is, not once during the beginning of me standing up and speaking out about the rampant problem of consent violations and victim-shaming and silencing within our communities, not once during the first several posts, up to and including my controversial post, “Choosing Sides,“ did I even think about feminism. What I thought about were the countless people who had their consent violated, who were abused and raped and whose safewords and limits were ignored. What I thought about were the ways in which I had been shushed when I tried to politely raise these same concerns, in the preceding years, within my local community. What I thought about was how much we were getting it wrong. What I thought about was trying to do what little I could do to change all that.

Feminism never entered my mind, then.

The first time that mental association was even considered was when some of the people trying to shush and shame me over taking my stand threw it out as an accusation. As an insult. And that’s exactly how it felt. That’s still the picture I had in my head.

Through post after post, I started making friends. I started getting comments and private messages about others’ stories. About how often this happens, and the sadly predictable paths it almost always takes. I lost a lot of ‘friends’ who didn’t agree with my approach, or my stance, or who maintained a relationship with my abuser, tried to shelter others, or outright blamed me for what happened. I gained a lot of friends who knew better. Most of them are feminists.

I started rethinking my ideas about feminism. I’m still not very fond of the term, especially as it’s used by the extremists on both sides. The MRAs and general asshats who like to tout personal responsibility to every woman who just stopped blaming herself long enough to speak up make me feel pretty stabby. Likewise, there’s an awful lot of, FSM! Could you PLEASE just not be on my side with your extremist BS?

What I’ve realized is, every subculture has its extremists, and they simply don’t define the subculture. Only its outliers. As it applies to the thing so many of us are advocating right now, this really isn’t an extreme viewpoint. We just want for everyone to have the right not to be touched, in whatever way, unless they want it. We want for those folks, of whatever role or gender, who can’t or won’t respect that right, to not be welcome in our spaces. We want for the onus of personal responsibility to shift to where it belongs: the people who harm others.

If that makes me a feminist, then I’ll wear that label proudly.

Just remember, you MRAs and “False accusation” shouters and shamers and blamers and violators and “DRAMA” accusers and “personal responsibility” gurus, you’re the ones who both gave me that label, and the reason to wear it.

I never said, as a kid, “I want to be a feminist when I grow up.” But I am, and you played a part in that. Deal with it.